NEW YORK City's electricity provider Con Edison locked out 8,500 workers on July 1 after their union, Utility Workers Union of America (UWUA) Local 1-2, refused to buckle and accept company demands for concessions.

The stakes are high, not only for workers and the company, but all New York City residents. Con Ed imposed its lockout while the city was in the grips of a scorching heat wave, with the power system under pressure to keep up with growing demand.

But that didn't stop management from attacking union workers when they wouldn't cave--which shows that this fight is about Corporate America trying to strike a blow against labor, as one worker told Alternet: "A lot of greed, a lot of arrogance. Blame the unions, blame the workers, take their benefits away, and just keep increasing their bonuses."

One main issue in contract negotiations has been pensions. The company wants to switch from defined-benefit pensions to 401(k) plans for new hires and unvested employees. Management also wants to nearly double workers' contributions for health insurance to $133 a week for a family plan--with co-pays increasing from $28 to $40. This would basically wipe out the token raise of $1 an hour being offered.

The company also wants to change sick leave policy. As it is, workers are "allowed" three sick "frequencies" per year (a frequency is one to three days off in a row). After the third "frequency," they are written up. Another frequency results in suspension and denial of raises and promotions for one year.

The company wants to make even that draconian policy even harsher. According to Mike, a ConEd worker on the picket line this week, the company proposal would "reduce pay while on medical leave to 75 percent the first week, 65 percent after six weeks, 55 percent after 12 weeks and termination after 26 weeks."

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THE UNION had threatened a strike when the current contract expired in the early morning hours of July 1, but Local 1-2 officials say they offered to keep members working under the terms of the old contract while talks continued. However, according to an In These Times report, Con Ed demanded that the union promise seven days' notice before declaring a strike. When Local 1-2 refused, the company initiated the lockout.

As of Sunday, the company said it had a workforce of 5,000 managers, retirees and replacement workers maintaining operations--a sign that it was prepared for a stoppage. On the picket line, workers said they believed ConEd had brought in a new president, Craig Ivey, several years ago in order to "bust the union."

But now, unqualified people are doing very dangerous work, a risk to their own safety and that of the community. As Bruce Prescod, a 27-year veteran of Con Ed, said in an interview on the picket line:

Right now, there's a big danger with "stray voltage" at manholes and other locations throughout the city, which normally teams of workers would go around the city checking and fixing. Management simply doesn't have the resources to do this, so this aspect, along with others, is being neglected. Additionally, management is simply not qualified to do many of the jobs, so that--and the fact that most repairs being done now are dangerous patch jobs that will need to be corrected later--contributes to growing electrical danger.

Another worker who has been at Con Ed for 24 years added: "About 5,000 management are trying to take the place of 9,000 union workers--an impossible task, especially considering that the managers are mostly only college-trained, while those who used to be workers did hands-on work 15 or 20 years ago, so they don't have the requisite experience."

After the lockout began, the union made an immediate call for a show of force on the picket lines on Monday, July 2. Workers were spirited and angry as they stood outside Con Ed offices and facilities, yelling "Scab!" and worse as management came out of the building.

The picketers were joined by a contingent from the Communications Workers of America, which has been in a long-running battle with Verizon that included a strike late last summer.

At one picket line was a large group of nonunion office cleaners who worked for T&T Cleaning and Janitorial Services at Con Edison headquarters. Twelve of the workers were fired without notice on June 29, just prior to the lockout. The workers believe they were being punished for attempting to organize a union.

According to Armando, an organizer with Service Employees International Union Local 32BJ, there have been efforts to organize the workers for the past three years, but each time the union makes progress, Con Edison changes contractors, defeating the organizing drive. The workers for T&T had been cleaning offices at Con Ed for about a year, with no benefits or sick leave. One worker, Doralisa Feliz, said she had to work a full day with a fever and bad cold because management workers that anyone calling in sick without a doctor's note would no longer have a job with T&T.

Lorena, another of the 12 fired workers, explained how T&T had increased the workload through overtime. But without a union, the workers couldn't protest the speedup, even when new demands of the job led to injuries. Lorena herself sas injured when a ceiling light fell on her.

Now these workers are joining the fight of other Con Edison workers in the hopes of regaining their jobs--and unionizing.

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NATURALLY, MANAGEMENT is trying to portray locked-out workers as greedy. But Joe, a Con Ed worker for over 20 years, pointed out that many union members at the company are highly skilled tradesmen. Even so, he said, "it takes eight years to get to the top pay scale at Con Ed, while with most other tradesmen [at other companies], it only takes five years."

But it's glaringly obvious where the real greed is at Con Ed--in the corporate boardroom.

Con Ed's CEO Kevin Burke has been getting richer and richer compensation packages in recent years. The New York Post reported his 2010 salary was $1.1 million--but on top of that, he raked in $9.2 million in benefits, bonuses and stock awards. All told, he got a 30 percent raise that year. As one locked-out worker put it, "They don't hesitate to give him a private jet to fly all over the world in, while letting us just get hurt on the job."

Safety was exactly the issue that another worker on the picket line, Ronald, wanted to talk about. He cited a recent example in which three workers were seriously injured on the job, suffering third-degree burns from an explosion. Instead of alerting other workers to what happened so they could take extra precautions, the company "kept it a secret," said Ronald. "They won't tell us who got hurt or how."

Another worker, James, agreed. He said he works "all day around high-voltage equipment. It's highly dangerous--[so dangerous that] they give you a lot of training and teach you how to be safe. Then, once you're on the job, they don't care about any of that. They just want you to get the job done, whatever it takes, whatever the danger."

Local 1-2 members say their refusal to accept concessions while Con Ed remains profitable isn't greedy at all. "This isn't about a pie in the sky, said one. "All we want is a fair wage." He went on to link the fight at Con Ed to other labor battles:

What we need is for every single union--communication workers, transit, everybody--to go out in unison until we get what we all need. Only then can we bring the city to its knees. Tell me one time in history where the lower classes got what they wanted by being polite and complacent. No, you have to stand together. Not just Con Ed, but all of Corporate America needs to learn a hard lesson: they can't operate without us.

Kyle Brown, Sean Larson and Hannah Marcerou contributed to this article. This article was originally published by the Socialist Worker.

This article is full of falsehoods. The union has self destructed. It once was host to 32,000 members, with 1,000 managerial employees. This unions leadership has allowed sun contractors on the properties for years.They had no due cause to walk out Saturday night, the company did offer an extension. A unions job is to work for the members, not destroy their livelihoods.

And YOU thought that the "Con" in Con Edison stood for Consolidated!
It's no coincidence that as union membership has dropped, and productivity has soared, wages have nonetheless stagnated. The blood-sucking rich get richer, and the rest of us get shafted.
God help us in a Romney regime.

The entire country is going back to the days like when federal troops could shoot at striking coal miners, and nobody seems to see that coming. It doesn't matter who you elect, YOU are still going to be the victims of any government you elect. Wake up people, and smell the prison gruel you'll all be swilling in a few years. The only way to stop this country from becoming a slave society once again is for all working class people to start fighting together in huge, mutually supportive masses of strikers. The minute some obscenely rich company like Con Ed pulls some evil stunt like this, union workers of all types, everywhere, for tens of miles around, should just shut the entire city of New York city down for a week in protest and support, IF they have to. Government will NEVER help you one tiny bit if you're just one little group of disgruntled workers in one locality, even in NYC and if you're 8,000 people. That's how the Indians lost America. Look what happened to them. Get it together on a GRAND scale! Germany is now called "The powerhouse of Europe". Does anyone out there realize that Germany is 100% unionized??? They have always been. So anytime some back stabbing politician comes on TV offering handouts to the 1% and starts blaming organized labor for all the financial problems in the world, the entire middle class population that put him into office should throw him out with a landslide defeat at the first available opportunity. Everyone should demand very loudly and constantly that he be recalled or impeached. Flood the government with emails, letters and phone calls complaining against the dirt bag. Make sure the scum never runs for public office again, anywhere. You CAN do it. All you have to do is DO IT! Next time you receive your proxy vote envelope in the mail as a Con Ed stockholder, EVERY union stockholder should vote NO to keeping ANY of the recommended board members. Throw ALL the slave owners out. Wipe the slate clean. Try ANYone else because you are guaranteed to lose everything by sticking with the Scrooges that are your corporate officers now. You have nothing to lose and everything to gain by trying. Con Ed's richest stockholders have put their own anti-labor Scrooges at the head of the company to doom YOU, your families and all your future generations to living like slaves for all eternity, entirely for THEIR profit. Humiliate them. Get rid of them. Make THEM unemployed for a while. Get it into the headlines. Give other organized labor the heads up on what scum these people are so when the evil ones show up somewhere else in the country trying to enslave other unsuspecting working people their reputations have preceeded them. Make the greedy blood suckers extremely obvious. Band them as blood sucking Vampires and make them pay the price by being so unwanted by working people everywhere that nobody will hire them again. Bust them down to size, people. Take those 10 million dollar bonuses back and get someone in charge who cares about you and working people.

I totally agree. I am a wife of Con Edison utility worker who works inside the man holes in the streets and I can tell you, my husband works very hard in all sorts of weather during the year. It is a dangerous job. Our medical coverage is already very high. We have a family we see different doctors every month. Believe me when I tell you the president of this company n vice president and all who are in management invest in stock holders. This man makes millions. He is what i call a very evil man with no heart. People don't be fool. This not a non-profit company this is a private multi million company. It Is not the unions fault,they want to work. They just want a fair settlement. Con Edison is taking advantage of the economic. The president had prepare for this strike since last year. They don't care for your lights to be on, or for those that are sick now in the hospital in this heat wave. They are full of greed. I tell you don't believe what Con Edison is saying. They are lowering the power all over the place. People of New York City help us stand and help us fight. May the lord grant us the victory. We are not in the days of slavery... There's just so much corruption going on in this company. Help us lord almighty.

Con Ed has BILLIONS yes I said BILLIONS in their pension system.Even with all the retirees out there it just keeps growing.This shows you just how greedy Corporate Con Ed is.It's time for all New Yorkers to stand up for the people who keep their electricity coming and gas flowing.